Healthcare launch short on explanations

The hand-wringing over the botched launch of the Affordable Care Act’s healthcare.gov component is understandable. It is a critical part of the insurance mandate that goes into effect Jan. 1.

The online marketplace gateway was so dysfunctional that a mere 1,370 Illinoisans signed up for healthcare during the first round.

The numbers have since improved; about 7,000 had signed up by the end of the second month in Illinois through getcoveredillinois.gov. Nationally, 364,682 signed up for private coverage under the new law, according to figures provided by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

That remains significantly lower than the projected target of 24,310 people by the end of November in Illinois. That number is from an internal memo obtained by The Associated Press.

So if the online gateway is working — at least working better — and the clock is quickly counting down toward the time when people will be required to have insurance coverage or face being fined, why the delay?

It might just be confusion, that state of mind that no one seems to have considered in the thousands of pages of print that outlined everything from income guidelines to pre-existing conditions. It accounted for a multitude of medical conditions and situations, but failed to take into account the human factor.

That was among some of the findings of a collective reporting project by Civitas Media publications across the Midwest, including Illinois.

People recognize the need for health insurance, but don’t know enough about the ins and outs of a system that has become mired in bureaucracy and technical terminology.

Most everyone can grasp the concept of the tier system the Affordable Care Act creates. There are bronze, silver, gold and platinum policies in order of coverage and, for most, cost.

But those levels also have widely varying deductibles — which is where a lot of insurance purchasers start losing comprehension. This is the amount a person is required to pay (beyond the premium cost) before coverage kicks in.

That could be $3,150 to $6,350 in Illinois, according to a Associated Press-sanctioned study by independent healthcare consultants Stonegate Advisors. The people buying the bronze plan — the most popular in the state because of its lower cost — can generally expect to pay more in deductibles.

It’s easy to understand where the head-scratching can set in. Many people will have dozens upon dozens of options for a health plan — some as many as 71 offerings.

That’s an incredible amount to try to figure out, and a lot of people won’t grasp the difference until they have to use the insurance.

Millions of dollars were spent getting the system into place and promoting its availability and the law.